After running for the Dana-Farber Marathon Challenge team in 1996, it wasn’t until 2002 that I legged out the 26 miles and 385 yards between Hopkinton and Boston again for charity, only this time it was for a different charitable organization, The Home for Little Wanderers.

Founded in 1799, The Home is a nationally renowned, private, non-profit child and family service agency providing services to more than 10,000 children and families each year.

Compared to some of the larger nonprofits taking part in the Boston Marathon Charity Program (such as the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute), The Home Team was a relatively small team – but our individual fundraising goals were comparable. In exchange for the opportunity to run Boston officially, we were required to raise a minimum of $2,500 each, a significant amount more than I had managed to bring in six years ago.

At the time, I didn’t know which was going to be a bigger challenge, running the marathon or raising the money, but I was certainly up for both.

Not that there weren’t obstacles to overcome. My fundraising campaign was launched just several months after September 11, 2001, one of the most trying times in our nation’s history. Not only were potential donors understandably preoccupied with the uneasy state of the world, but Americans were also faced with an uncertain economy and the threat of anthrax in the mail.

I couldn’t help but use patriotism as a theme.

“Let’s face it, September 11 has left many of us asking what we can do to help others,” I wrote. “I know I’m not talking about Ground Zero, but I do believe that taking care of others – anybody who needs us, anywhere – is an expression of patriotism. If you ask me, helping to create a brighter future for our children – every boy and girl – is helping to strengthen our national character.”

I also tried to make this appeal as personal as possible, using live, first class American Flag stamps. Each name and address was handwritten, the letters all personalized and my name was highlighted in green (one of The Home’s “corporate” colors) on the outside of the envelope. Finally, all donors had the option of signing up to receive periodic “marathon training updates” in which I kept people apprised of my progress by email.

This year, I mailed 141 letters and received 71 replies – just over a 50% response rate. I raised a grand total of $2,927, with an average gift of $41.22. This campaign also received two awards, a second and a third, from the New England Direct Marketing Association.

And, oh, I can’t forget about my time. I finished the marathon in 2002 in 4:06:34, just over three minutes slower than the 4:03:33 I ran in 1996, and almost six minutes faster than the 4:12:32 I notched the next year. That’s right, one experience with The Home Team was not enough. As Yogi Berra would have said, it was déjà vu all over again in 2003.

The third time I had run the Boston Marathon for charity, my fundraising strategy this time around was to appeal to my audience’s emotions by involving my two young sons, Scott and Ben (who were six and three, respectively, at the time), in the campaign. Children raising funds for children made sense to me.

On an otherwise plain, unadorned envelope, I used the words, “Photo Enclosed,” to draw prospects inside, where they found a small color photograph of me with my two boys in my arms – I was in my running garb, all sweaty and disheveled, having stopped along Heartbreak Hill during the previous year’s marathon. As a caption, in Scott’s handwriting, was this call to action: “Please help our dad help kids who aren’t as lucky as us!”

Sustaining this theme, the accompanying letter suggested that, “For many of us, childhood was a fairy tale, and our grown-up years are following suit. But for some kids out there, life isn’t all good.”

It was for these kids – the unlucky ones – that I was running the Boston Marathon.

All of us on this year’s Home Team were also set up with our own personalized online giving page, where we were able to accept secure donations on behalf of The Home for Little Wanderers.

I couldn’t have been happier with my audience’s reaction. Out of 134 people who received this direct mail appeal, 68 responded favorably with a charitable contribution – resulting in almost the same response rate (just north of 50%) as the previous year’s campaign. The mail alone was responsible for bringing in $3,153, but I also used a poster and several different emails to enhance my fundraising efforts, which added $335 to the coffers. When all was said and done, my 2003 Boston Marathon campaign raised $3,488 for The Home, with an average gift of $45.89. And to top it all off, the New England Direct Marketing Association honored this campaign with two first place awards.

Note: Written by Yellowfin Direct Marketing’s Bob Cargill, this is part three of a four-part series on running the Boston Marathon for charity. Part four will include a case study of Bob’s own personal fundraising campaign on behalf of Children’s Hospital Boston. The entire series will be featured here in A Fine Kettle of Fish. To sponsor Bob’s marathon run on April 18, 2005, for Children’s Hospital Boston, please click here first, then click on the Sponsor a Runner button. Charitable gifts of any amount – even just a dollar – are greatly appreciated.

I may have clocked my best time ever for this race the first time I ran it – as a “bandit” – in 1981 (3:34:24), but the best experiences I have had in Boston have been when I have run the marathon for charity.

Indeed, for those who are running it for a charitable organization, this historic marathon is not just an enormous challenge, it’s also an opportunity to make a difference in other people’s lives, a good way to feel like a champion come race day even though you may be pulling up the rear.

The Boston Athletic Association’s Boston Marathon Charity Program is the quintessential pledge-based fundraising event for the average runner who otherwise might never have the chance to officially take part in such an elite competition.

It’s a classic win-win-win situation in which the athlete, donor and charity – fervently bound together on behalf of one common cause – all stand to gain.

For instance, the Dana-Farber Marathon Challenge team, one of the first nonprofit organizations to take part in this program, hopes to raise more than $3 million this year to support the Claudia Adams Barr Program in Innovative Basic Cancer Research at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

As a member of this team in 1996, I ran the marathon in memory of my cousin, Douglas Ewing, who had recently succumbed to melanoma after a long, hard five-year battle with the disease.

Using the team’s official Dana-Farber stationery, I mailed an emotional appeal for funds to 100 of my closest friends, relatives and colleagues, asking them to “participate in this team effort to beat cancer” by sponsoring my run.

“With your financial support, every stride I take will hopefully bring the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute closer to a cure for cancer,” I wrote.

“My cousin, Doug, lost his battle to cancer at age 41. But together, we can help save others from such a sad fate by joining the Dana-Farber Marathon Challenge.”

Along with this letter, I also enclosed a copy of a moving tribute to my cousin that had been published in his hometown newspaper, the Vineyard Gazette – assuming the more my audience knew about Doug, the more inclined they would be to support my fundraising efforts. Including this article put a brave, inspirational face on such a devastating, dread disease.

The response from those on the receiving end of this appeal was quick, positive and, to say the least, encouraging. Of the 100 people who received it, 47 were kind enough to lend their financial assistance. My personal fundraising campaign brought in an average gift of $33.95 and raised a total of $1,596 for the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, thanks to the generosity of all the people I knew, not to mention all the people I didn’t know at the Boston Athletic Association (those who made this charity program possible in the first place).

Note: Written by Yellowfin Direct Marketing’s Bob Cargill, this is part two of a four-part series on running the Boston Marathon for charity. Parts three and four will include case studies of Bob’s own personal fundraising campaigns on behalf of The Home for Little Wanderers and Children’s Hospital Boston. The entire series will be featured here in A Fine Kettle of Fish. To sponsor Bob’s marathon run this year (April 18, 2005) on behalf of Children’s Hospital Boston, please click here first, then click on the Sponsor a Runner button. Charitable gifts of any amount – even just a dollar – are greatly appreciated.

Everyone has heard of the Boston Marathon. It’s the mother of all road races, the most celebrated of them all. Held each year on Patriot’s Day, a holiday recognized only in Massachusetts and Maine, its legendary course stretches a long, laborious 26 miles and 385 yards, country point to city point, from the sleepy, little town of Hopkinton, Massachusetts, to the heart of the state’s capital.

I get tired just thinking about it.

But seriously, for a runner like me, any agony experienced along the way is worth the ecstasy at the end. It doesn’t get any better than crossing the finish line of what is arguably the most prestigious road race in the world.

Meeting the eligibility requirements to run the Boston Marathon isn’t easy, though. For me, it would be next to impossible. Official entrants must have run a fast, qualifying time in another marathon within the last year or so. At my age, 46, that time would be three hours and 30 minutes. Yikes! I’m an avid runner, participating in about 20 races a year, but I’m not that fleet of foot.

Sure, you can run Boston as a “bandit,” starting the race at the back of the pack and going the distance without an official number. You might not get a medal at the finish, but you’ll still get plenty of cheers and high fives from a giddy throng of spectators along the route. Of the six Boston’s on my resume so far, I’ve exercised this option for half of them.

There’s another way to take part in the Boston Marathon, however, one that adds a greater level of significance to what is already a very personal and physically-demanding challenge. The Boston Athletic Association, the non-profit organization that hosts this fabled event, waives the qualifying standards to about 1,100 participants who agree to raise money for a local charity. Since this program was formalized in 1994, Boston Marathon participants have raised nearly $50 million for dozens of worthwhile causes.

Fortunately, I’ve had the opportunity to participate in this wonderfully unique program three times already, once for the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute (in 1996), and twice for The Home for Little Wanderers (in 2002 and 2003). This spring, I’ll be running the Boston Marathon for another well-known charitable organization, Children’s Hospital Boston.

Note: Written by Yellowfin Direct Marketing’s Bob Cargill, this is part one of a four-part series on running the Boston Marathon for charity. Parts two, three and four will include case studies of Bob’s own personal fundraising campaigns on behalf of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, The Home for Little Wanderers and Children’s Hospital Boston. The entire series will be featured here in A Fine Kettle of Fish over the course of the next few weeks. To sponsor Bob’s marathon run this year (April 18, 2005) on behalf of Children’s Hospital Boston, please click here first, then click on the Sponsor a Runner button.

Terry Gets Lax

In today’s Boston Herald, the Inside Track reports that Terry Francona, manager of the World Champion Boston Red Sox, has signed on as a spokesman for Metamucil. According to the article, written by Track gals Gayle Fee and Laura Raposa, the Sox skipper has “been downing the fiber laxative daily for a decade.”

H-m-m-m, maybe that explains why Procter & Gamble ran such a prominent Sox “congratulatory” ad for its popular fiber supplement so soon after the conclusion of the latest – and perhaps most remarkable – postseason chapter in Major League Baseball history. The company was behind Terry every step of the way.

If you recall, following the Sox’s World Series victory, I wrote an article here – in A Fine Kettle of Fish – in which I ranked all the “congratulatory” ads that were put to paper on behalf of the Boston baseball club. There were some amazingly creative ads from Gillette (“Faith over Doubt, Guts over Ghosts, Destiny over Dynasty, Sox over Cards”), Sylvania (“Here’s to all the fans who kept a light on for the Red Sox. And to our team’s shining victory!”), ESPN (“Hello God. I’m a Red Sox fan. Nice to finally meet you.”) and others.

But guess which among them I ranked number one? You got that right. P&G’s creative team swung for the fence and hit a monstrous home run with its ad for Metamucil, (“Way to go! Congratulations Boston on your World Championship. Let’s hope it becomes a regular thing!”).

Of course, now that the Red Sox have won their first World Series in 86 years, let’s hope Terry doesn’t get too lax.

A Dip in Donations to Non-Tsunami Relief Nonprofits?

Americans have risen to the occasion and already given millions of dollars to support tsunami relief efforts, but according to the Association of Fundraising Professionals (AFP), “it is quite probable that charities working on issues unrelated to tsunami relief will see a decrease in their fundraising in the short-term.”

Consistent with charitable giving patterns following 9/11 and other major tragedies, “most charities will not see any long-term impact” as a result of the tsunami disaster, AFP recently told its members.

“AFP believes that people recognize that the tsunami relief effort represents a special gift, over and above what individuals and organizations would normally give,” reported the association. “Your local women’s shelter; universities offering bursaries and scholarships; AIDS prevention programs at home and abroad; ongoing hurricane recovery in the Caribbean; food banks; and the many other important organizations in our communities will continue to count on the generosity of the public.”

AFP’s position is that “the response to tsunami fundraising relief efforts seems to support the idea that donors understand that this is a special or extra gift. Again, in the short term, it is likely that organizations not involved in the tsunami relief will see a small dip in their giving, but we expect this to balance out over the coming months.”

For information on how giving has rebounded following major national and international events, AFP invites members to go to a special 9/11 section on its Web site, which you will find here.

The Association of Fundraising Professionals represents 26,000 members (including Yellowfin Direct Marketing) in 172 chapters throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico and China working to advance philanthropy through advocacy, research, education and certification programs.

In the Wake of the Tsunami, Blogs Show ROI (and More)

A couple of weeks ago, Paul Chaney of the Radiant Marketing Group blog, asked me for my “take on Bob Bly’s argument that there is no ROI potential in blogging, at least none that he sees.”

He wanted to know how I, as a direct marketer, saw blogs fitting the mold.

My reply to him (verbatim) was this:

“With a blog, you may not get an immediate and demonstrable ROI, but like a good PR initiative, blogging certainly can lead to new business.

“As a veteran direct marketing copywriter and creative director, I’m not here to tell you that a blog can or will ever replace a good, old-fashioned direct mail letter as a sales tool. But I will say that anyone in advertising or marketing who isn’t able to at least see the potential of blogging – or any other online communications platform for that matter – is either misinformed or just plain obstinate. A blog is the perfect feedback magnet. It’s a quick and easy way to interlock a circle of like-minded people – customers, prospects, colleagues, peers, whomever. What to do with them after that only time will tell. After all, it seems that most bloggers are more technologists than marketers. Just wait till more of the latter join the blogosphere!”

Ten minutes later, I sent Paul the following addendum:

“By the way, check out this definition of direct marketing:

“H-m-m-m, given this definition, I would think that it wouldn’t be too much of a stretch at all to say that a blog really is, in effect, a direct marketing tool – assuming you are using it as an advertising medium.”

All that was said before the earth moved so violently on December 26, 2004.

In the ten days since that devastating earthquake and tsunami walloped southern Asia, countless blogs have been used to help raise funds for those victimized by this mother of all disasters. Each of these blogs, like A Fine Kettle of Fish, has been used to redirect loyal readers to Web sites owned and operated by World Vision, the American Red Cross, Oxfam America, CARE, UNICEF and other nonprofit organizations that are accepting donations on behalf of hundreds of thousands of innocent victims. Each of these blogs has been used as an incredibly effective direct marketing tool, demonstrating not just a quick ROI, but also that the blogosphere, like the world in which we live, has a compassionate face.